Wendy Brooks hated uncertainty.
For most of her career, uncertainty had belonged to other people.
The executive wondering whether their marriage was about to collapse.
The politician wondering who had leaked a conversation.
The CEO wondering why a trusted employee suddenly knew things they shouldn't know.
Those people lived with uncertainty.
Wendy created it.
She manipulated it.
She profited from it.
Yet for the past week she had been staring at her phone and feeling something she hadn't experienced in years.
Doubt.
She sat inside a small café near the river, a half-finished coffee cooling beside her laptop. Outside, people drifted past the windows beneath gray afternoon skies. Inside, soft music played through hidden speakers.
None of it held her attention.
Her eyes remained fixed on Alice's profile.
Their message history stretched back months.
Conversations.
Advice.
Long discussions.
Trust.
The kind of relationship Wendy specialized in building.
